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8 a.m. on a Sunday in 2023. I woke up unable to walk, screaming in the worst pain I have ever felt in my life. I’ve had skin cancer surgeries, broken ankles and fingers, and several concussions. NOTHING prepared me for the pain of my disc exploding into my spinal cord.

My health insurance was set to kick in one week later.

So, really: Who the fuck do you think you are? And what are people going to think when you show up differently?

I ask myself these questions on a regular basis. Existential questions and self-doubt come to the forefront when you’ve been kicked in the teeth like so many of us have been over the past few years. To understand how I ended up on that floor, you have to go back to where it started.

Crying into My Martini

When I published my book, Get Stuck In!, in 2022, it was at the prodding of one of my closest friends. I was crying into my martini at a restaurant in San Francisco, whining to him about how I didn’t know what I was going to do now that I had sold my company and cities were finally opening up again after COVID.

I had zero idea what I was going to do during that period of time, and writing a book wasn’t on my radar. But I did it anyway. That same year, I also published a co-authored book project.

I then began a fairly successful life and transition coaching practice, with the book as a backup and social proof that you, too, could quit your job, build a company, take in your teenage nephew, scale the company, and sell it 10 years later.

And even though I believe that to be true, it’s not easy. As I started building my coaching practice, I started losing my own identity. I was NOT enjoying the social media marketing, and I despise doing videos of myself. I didn’t want to build my coaching business on Instagram or Facebook, but I didn’t know what else to do. And LinkedIn? That place has become a cesspool of bullshit.

Change by Force

My life changed significantly in 2021 when I herniated discs in my back. Thirty years of soccer — both playing and coaching — caught up with me. And I no longer had my company’s income paying for my life. I had invested $$$$$ in publishing both books, on top of paying for healthcare out of pocket.

Self-employment is expensive, especially when you’re chasing coaching clients for a new business you’re quickly realizing you don’t enjoy. And when you’re dumping all of your money into taking care of your health, you realize fast that something HAS to change.

Change by choice and change by force are two different things. I had to stop coaching soccer because of my back. I had to find someplace that would provide health insurance, and quickly. So what were the three places near me that offered health insurance to part-time employees? Starbucks, Costco, and Trader Joe’s. Since I live across the street from a Costco, it was my first choice, and it paid better than the other two.

What I didn’t factor into that choice was the sheer manual labor required to work at Costco — and with herniated discs, that was not easy. You already know how that ended: on my floor, one week before my insurance kicked in.

What No One Tells You

I was taken by ambulance to the hospital and spent five days there. I had emergency back surgery to get me walking again. In an instant, my life as an athlete and my identity were shattered. It’s not that I was still competing as a soccer player, but I was an active person who worked out five times a week — running, lifting weights, etc. — while coaching soccer. Now I was trying to recover from back surgery after not being able to walk.

No one tells you about the sheer pain of nerves regrowing — cramping in your legs and feet so severe, even while you sleep, that you have bruises up and down your legs.

No one tells you that when you live by yourself, you have to do everything alone, even crawling to the bathroom because you can’t walk. And you have to get the fuck up off the floor and find a way to get the help you need.

620 Applications

I took the Costco job thinking it would be temporary. That changed the moment my disc blew. I needed the healthcare, and there was no walking away from it.

But about 80% of all Costco work is harsh manual labor, and I knew my back couldn’t do that forever. I had to have the vision to find my way out.

So I looked outside. I sent out 620 job applications. Not one of them turned into a full-time job.

Any good coach will tell you that no matter how well you prepare for an opponent, they might throw something at you that you were not prepared for and you have to change your strategy in the middle of a match. So, I stopped searching outside and started searching WITHIN Costco. That’s where I found the optical path.

Since 2023, my life has been one never-ending mantra of “just take the next right step,” built into me from years of soccer, friendships that span decades, and the ability to ask for help from those I love the most.

And I am finally deciding to talk about it and share how I was able to shift gears and start a new chapter. Reinvention is not pretty. It’s literally answering the question every single day — “Who the fuck do you think you are?” — and having the audacity to become it.

My writing is for those of us in the fuckery of the messy middle: a strange political climate, and no magic eight ball.

If that’s you, you’re my people. Subscribe. Share this with someone who’s crawling off their own floor right now. And tell me in the comments: what question are you afraid to answer?

No Lack. No Limits. Thank you for reading. Thank you for being here. You matter. And it’s time for you to "Get Stuck In!”™

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